Posted!

Join the Conversation

Comments

Welcome to our new and improved comments, which are for subscribers only.
This is a test to see whether we can improve the experience for you.
You do not need a Facebook profile to participate.

You will need to register before adding a comment.
Typed comments will be lost if you are not logged in.

Please be polite.
It's OK to disagree with someone's ideas, but personal attacks, insults, threats, hate speech, advocating violence and other violations can result in a ban.
If you see comments in violation of our community guidelines, please report them.

Korean War veteran's place in history literally etched in stone

The wife of a late Korean War and Army veteran, Charles Clinkingbeard, was unable to make the journey to lay a wreath on his gravesite. Stephanie Stuckey, organizer of Wreaths from the Heart, helped Mrs. Clinkingbeard out. About 570 wreaths were laid on gravesites at Alexandria National Cemetery Saturday as part of Wreaths Across America Day.

A photo of the 88-year-old Korean War veteran who served in the U.S. Navy is etched into the Korean War Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington D.C.

"My grandson was the one who found it when he and my great-granddaughter were visiting Washington D.C.," he said.

His grandson, Jonathan Guillot, was accompanying his daughter and Gene's great-granddaughter Ava Guillot, a Grace Christian School student, on a school trip to Washington D.C. in March.

"They have a school school trip that they go on every year", said Guillot. "He'd gone with her."

Ava Guillot and her father Jonathan Guillot, great-granddaughter and grandson of Gene Guillot, pose with a photo of Gene as a young sailor that is etched in the Korean War Memorial in Washington D.C.(Photo: Courtesy)

Neither Guillot nor anyone in his family knew that his photo was on the memorial. As far as he knows, no one else in Alexandria or Central Louisiana knew about it either.

When Ava and Jonathan visited the Korean War Veteran Memorial Wall, they saw a young Gene Guillot, who would have been about 22 or 23 years old, peering back.

"They said the minute they saw it, they knew who it was," he said. They took a photo with each standing alongside the picture of a young Gene and sent to to him.

He was just as surprised as they were to see it.

"I couldn't believe," laughed Guillot. "Yeah, I couldn't believe. I didn't have any idea that it was there or that there was one."

As for who took the original photo and for what purpose he doesn't know. He thinks it was made in Korea but he's not positive.

"That's been a lot of years ago," said Guillot.

He served in Korea in the early 1950s. "I'm trying to think — that was like '51-'52 or '52-53 — along in there."

Guillot was a frogman serving aboard the USS Deliver ARS-23.

"They call them SEALS nowadays," said Guillot.

After serving in the U.S. Navy, he returned to his job at BellSouth Telephone and raised his family in Alexandria.

"I've been living here 60-something years but I'm from the big city of Echo," said Guillot.

So how does Guillot feel about his photo engraved on a historical monument in the nation's capital?

"It's feels good," said Guillot. "I feel good about it. It's a good surprise."